The CEO of the London Pensions Fund Authority, Jo Donnelly, made some candid observations about the government’s power over the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) at the PLSA LGPS conference in Bedfordshire.
She focused in on the two powers the government now hold over the LGPS, the first being the ability to direct funds to a specific pool. Which, Donnelly described “as a bit of a surprise to some of us.”
The government introduced the power in the Pension Schemes Bill to give it the authority to force an LGPS fund to join a specific pool.
Secondly, the government could have the power to force funds to merge.
“Seeing the government take powers they haven’t held previously is a very interesting step, and tells us where the government is on achieving their policy aims with the LGPS,” said Donnelly.
When it came to the government and its recent consultation, Donnelly noted that in percentage terms, those in favour of some proposals was sometimes lacking.
“There were an awful lot of people against a whole lot of proposals – that made no difference and they [the government] went ahead with them anyway,” said Donnelly.
She also focused in on governance proposals, where there is a need to appoint an LGPS senior officer at a fund. ”I think that is a positive step forward which hopefully address conflicts of interest, particularly those funds that have council administered authorities,” said Donnelly.
She also noted that when it comes to local investment, it is the job of the pools to report this annually. “So that is not something a fund has to do individually,” she said.
Comments